Google realized 'inevitability' of Online News Act and struck a deal, expert says

In the wake of Google’s deal with the federal government to support Canadian news organizations, one expert is suggesting big tech companies are starting to see the writing on the wall.

On Wednesday, the federal government announced it reached a deal with Google under the Online News Act to cap payments made to Canadian news organizations at $100 million, down from the original proposal of $172 million. 

While Meta chose to block news content from its products, Richard Lachman, associate professor at the RTA School of Media at the Toronto Metropolitan University, believes Google may have been more inclined to make a deal.

“I do think the tech companies are realizing there’s an inevitability to this,” he told BNN Bloomberg in a television interview Wednesday.